2012 Election

Hamilton knew that a Republican Government needed Men of Virtue for it to Survive

Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus left his plough to defend the Roman Republic. Became dictator. Defeated the enemy. Resigned the dictatorship. And returned to his plough. The epitome of a republican ruler. Voluntarily giving up absolute power to preserve the republic. America had its own Cincinnatus. George Washington. Lucius Sergius Catilina (Catiline) was basically the anti-Cincinnatus. Whereas Cincinnatus was honorable, virtuous, principled and selfless Catiline was not. Where Cincinnatus tried to save the Roman Republic Catiline tried to overthrow it. America had its own Catiline. Aaron Burr.

Burr was an unprincipled opportunist. While George Washington approached politics by asking what was best for the country Aaron Burr asked what was best for Aaron Burr. Washington loathed politics and tried to stay above it. Whereas for Burr politics were the only good thing about governing. Burr entered politics at the birth of political parties in the US. As the tensions were building up between Hamilton’s Federalists and Jefferson’s Republicans. Burr started out as a Federalist. But chafed in a subordinate role to Hamilton. The titular head of the Federalist Party. So he left the Federalist Party and became a Republican. He accepted an appointment from Republican New York governor George Clinton as attorney general. New York had two Federalist senators in Congress. And Hamilton wanted to keep those seats Federalist. He tried to appeal to Burr’s principles to get him to return to the Federalist Party. But Burr had no principles. And when Governor Clinton backed him for Senator he stayed Republican. And won one of those seats.

Being Senator was nice but Burr wanted to be governor of New York. He tried to make a deal with the Federalists. He knew they wanted to get rid of Republican Governor Clinton and replace him with a Federalist governor. He wanted to be that Federalist governor. But Hamilton was a lot like Washington. He had principles. And put the country first. Hamilton knew that a republican government needed men of virtue for it to survive. And Burr had no virtue. So he was not interested in making any deals with Burr.

Alexander Hamilton called Aaron Burr the American Catiline

In the election of 1800 Thomas Jefferson needed New York. And Burr had connections. So Jefferson asked for his help. And he delivered. By changing the New York electors from Federalist to Republican. Jefferson then added Burr to the Republican ticket in the 1800 election. At that time the president was the candidate who won the most votes. And the vice president was the candidate who won the second most votes. Burr and Jefferson tied. Instead of conceding the election to Jefferson (the whole point in enlisting Burr’s help was to get Jefferson elected president) he forced the House of Representatives to vote 36 times until the tie was finally broken. Thus alienating Burr from Jefferson forever. Knowing that Jefferson would drop him from the Republican ticket in the 1804 election he began talking to New York Federalists again. Who wanted Burr to run for New York governor. And he was more than willing to switch parties again as he was completely unprincipled and offered himself to the party that made it most worth his while. It was at this time that Hamilton called Burr the American Catiline.

Also at this time there was a Federalist plot in New England. Should Jefferson win reelection in 1804 there were plans for New England to secede from the union. With Burr’s help New York would secede and join in a northern confederacy. Hamilton knew of the plot. And desperately wanted to stop it. For it was the last thing he wanted was for the American union to dissolve. He turned up his public attacks on Burr. Which helped Burr lose the election in New York. Attacks that Burr took exception to. Challenging him to a duel to restore his honor besmirched by Hamilton’s attacks. So on July11, 1804, Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton crossed the Hudson River to Weehawken, New Jersey. And exchanged pistol shots at 10 paces. Hamilton reportedly fired his shot harmlessly past Burr. Not wishing to hurt him while at the same time exposing himself to danger so as not to besmirch his honor. Burr’s shot, though, found Hamilton. He died the following day. Burr won the duel. But he lost his reputation and his political future.

Burr then headed west. Where he had planned to set himself up in an independent nation formed by parts of Mexico, Louisiana and Texas. He may have tried to get Great Britain involved. And he may have had plans of going to war with Spain. The details are a little sketchy. But he was up to something. When President Jefferson learned of his activities he had Burr arrested and indicted for treason. He was acquitted of treason at his trial. But the trial destroyed whatever was left of his political career after killing Hamilton.

If Aaron Burr were Alive Today he would likely endorse the Democrat Candidates Barack Obama and Joe Biden

If Burr were alive today he would be in awe of what the federal government became. Back in his days there were few federal jobs available. But today? He could live the life he always wanted. And he wouldn’t even have to win an election. All he would need to do is use his political connections to obtain a position in the federal bureaucracy. A post for life. And with an ever expanding federal government there would always be a post for life somewhere in that magnificent bureaucracy. Where politics ruled. Not principles. Where government spending soars regardless of the consequences. And class warfare creates a new aristocracy. Not the top 10% earners who pay 70% of federal income taxes. Or the bottom 50% who pay no federal income taxes. No, the new aristocracy is the federal bureaucracy that sits on top of this great wealth transfer. Like the nobility of old. Only without the need of having a good last name.

Had Burr lived today he would have looked at the federal government and cried out, “Where have you been all my life?” He would support anyone furthering this massive government expansion. Especially those practitioners of class warfare. The Democrat Party. If Aaron Burr were alive today he would likely endorse the Democrat candidates Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

THOMAS JEFFERSON HATED Alexander Hamilton. So much so he hired Philip Freneau as a translator in his State Department in George Washington’s administration. You see, Jefferson did not like confrontation. So he needed a way to slander Hamilton, his policies and the Washington administration without getting his own hands dirty. And that was what Freneau was supposed to do with the money he earned while working in the State Department. Publish a newspaper (National Gazette) and attack Hamilton, his policies and the Washington administration. Papers then were partisan. More so than today. Then, lies and libel were tools of the trade. And they knew how to dig up the dirt. Or make it up.

Another scandalmonger, James Callender, was slinging dirt for Jefferson. And he hit pay dirt. Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds of Philadelphia had a lucrative business. They were blackmailing Alexander Hamilton. Mr. Reynolds had his wife seduce Hamilton. Which she did. And did well. They had an affair. And Mr. Reynolds then blackmailed him. Jefferson pounced. Or, rather, Callender did. To keep Jefferson’s hands clean. Hamilton, Callender said, was using his position at the Treasury Department for personal gain. He was using public funds to pay the blackmailer. They found no proof of this. And they did look for it. Hard. But when they came up empty, Jefferson said that it just proved what a good thief Hamilton was. He was so good that he didn’t leave any traces of his treachery behind.

Of course, when you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas. And Jefferson’s association with Callender would come back and bite him in the ass. In a big way. Upset because Jefferson didn’t appropriately compensate him for all his loyal dirt slinging (he wanted the postmaster’s job in Richmond), he publicized the Sally Hemings rumors. And after breaking the true story of the Hamilton affair, many would believe this scoop. That Jefferson was having an affair with one of his slaves. It was a dark cloud that would forever hang over Jefferson. And his legacy.

Hamilton admitted to his affair. Jefferson admitted to no affair. Hamilton would never hold public office again and would later die in a duel with Jefferson’s one-time toady, Aaron Burr. This duel resulted because Hamilton was doing whatever he could to keep the amoral and unscrupulous Burr from public office (in this case, it was the governorship of New York). When the election of 1800 resulted in a tie between Jefferson and Burr, Hamilton urged the House to vote for Jefferson, his archenemy. Despite what had appeared in the press, Hamilton did have morals and scruples. Unlike some. Speaking of which, Jefferson would go on to serve 2 terms as president. And all of that angst about Hamiltonian policies? They all went out the window with the Louisiana Purchase (which was unconstitutional, Big Government and Big Finance).

RONALD REAGAN WAS routinely called old, senile and out of touch by the entertainment community, the media and his political foes. But he bested Mikhail Gorbachev and the Soviet Union, something Jimmy Carter never did. He said ‘no’ at Reykjavik because he told the American people that he wouldn’t give up the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). He knew the Soviet Union was bleeding. Communism was a farce. It inhibited human capital. And impoverished her people. SDI may have been science fiction in the 1980s, but capitalism wasn’t. It could do it all. Including SDI. The Soviet Union was on the ropes and Reagan would give no quarter. The days of living in fear of the mushroom cloud were over. And capitalism would deliver the knockout punch.

Reaganomics, of course, made this all possible. Supply-side economics. Which follows the Austrian school. Say’s Law. ‘Supply creates demand’. You don’t stimulate the economy by taxing one group of people so another group can spend. You stimulate it by creating incentives for risk takers to take risks. And when they do, they create jobs. And wealth.

Tax and spend is a failed Keynesian, zero-sum economic policy. When you take from the earners and give to the non-earners, we just transfer purchasing power. We don’t create it. For some to spend more, others must spend less. Hence, zero-sum. The net some of goods and services people are purchasing remains the same. Different people are just doing the purchasing.

When Apple invented the Macintosh personal computer (PC), few were demanding a PC with a graphical user interface (GUI). But Apple was innovative. They created something they thought the people would want. And they did. They took a risk. And the Macintosh with its mouse and GUI took off. Apple manufacturing increased and added jobs. Retail outlets for the Macintosh expanded and created jobs. Software firms hired more engineers to write code. And other firms hired more people to engineer and manufacture PC accessories. There was a net increase in jobs and wealth. Just as Say’s Law predicts. Supply-side economics works.

Of course, the Left hates Reagan and attacked Reaganomics with a vengeance. They attacked Reagan for being pro-rich. For not caring about the poor. And they revised history. They say the only thing the Reagan tax cuts gave us were record deficits. Of course, what those tax cuts gave us were record tax receipts. The government never collected more money. The House of Representatives (who spends the money), awash in cash, just spent that money faster than the treasury collected it. The record shows Reaganomics worked. Lower tax rates spurred economic activity. More activity generated more jobs and more personal wealth. Which resulted in more people paying more taxes. More people paying taxes at a lower rate equaled more tax revenue in the aggregate. It works. And it works every time people try it.

Because Reaganomics worked and showed the Left’s policies were failures, they had to attack Reagan. To discredit him. They had to destroy the man. Except when they’re running for elected office. Then they strive to show how much more Reagan-like they are than their conservative opponents. Because they know Reaganomics worked. And they know that we know Reaganomics worked.

GEORGE W. BUSH was routinely called an ‘idiot’ by the entertainment community, the media and his political foes. Yet this ‘idiot’ seems to have outwitted the elite of the liberal Left time and time again. I mean, if their policies were winning, they would be no reason to have attacked Bush in the first place. The Left hated him with such vitriol that they said he blew up the Twin Towers on 9/11 as a justification for invading Iraq for her oil. It was Big Oil’s lust for profit, after all, that was driving this Texan’s Big Oil policies. And taking Iraq’s oil would increase Big Oil’s sales and give her even more obscene profits.

If Bush was an idiot, he must have been an idiot genius to come up with a plan like that. Then again, gasoline prices crept to $4/gallon following the Iraq War. Had all that oil gone on the market according to plan, that wouldn’t have happened. Unless the plan was to keep that oil OFF of the market, thus, by rules of supply and demand, the price of oil (and the gasoline we make from it) would go up thus enriching Big Oil through higher prices resulting from a lower sales volume. My god, what evil genius. For an idiot. Of course, gas taxes, numerous summer gas blends (required by the government’s environmental policies), an aging and over-taxed pipeline infrastructure and insufficient refinery capacity (the government’s environmental policies make it too punishing even to consider building a new refinery) to meet increasing demand (soaring in India and China) had nothing to do with the rise in gas prices.

IS THE POLITICAL Left evil? Probably not. Just amoral. They have an agenda. They survive on political spoils and patronage. Old time politics. Enrich themselves through cronyism. If tribute is paid they’ll extend favorable treatment. If tribute is not paid, they will release their wrath via hostile regulation, litigation, Congressional investigation and punitive taxation. Just like they did to Big Tobacco (and, no, it wasn’t about our health. They could have just made tobacco illegal. But they didn’t. Why? It just brings in way too much money to the government. Via sin taxes. And federal lawsuits. And with it being addictive, it’s a frickin cash piñata for them.)

They know few agree with their philosophy. But they don’t care. It’s not about national prosperity. It’s about power. And they want it. That’s why they can’t debate the issues. They know they can’t win. So they attack the messenger. Not the message. If you don’t believe that, you can ask Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, Sarah Palin and just about any other Republican. Well, you can’t ask Lincoln or Reagan. But you can guess what they would say.